Nearly 100 Chinese teenagers shared lunch with about 50 Newark students Tuesday, swapping life stories and cultural observations between bites of fried chicken and macaroni and cheese at the New Community Corp. building in Newark.

The exchange was part of Fairleigh Dickinson University’s Emerging Global Leaders Seminar, which arranges two-week trips to the U.S. and other countries for teens from around the world. The Chinese delegation met teens working with the nonprofit New Community Corp.

"People are our world’s greatest resource, and we have to be able to communicate," Jo Anne Murphy, the university’s director of programs with intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations, told the group. "Who knows when some of you might be sitting across from one another at a United Nations table."

Across from each other at a lunch table, Rachel Jia, 15, of Shandong Province, chatted with Za-kiiya Mills, 16, of Newark. Jia was interested in the bin Laden takedown and other international events.

"Information is not as open in China. We are taught to see things from this perspective, missing a lot of details," she said. Jia said she was taught to oppose the Egyptian revolution. Then she heard U.N. panelists discuss it.

"Now I see it’s a strike for freedom and for better government," she said.

Mills asked about population and China’s one-child rule.

"I’m learning stuff I didn’t learn in school," she said. "Mostly that China’s nothing like the American movies make it out to be."

The two girls also talked about music — Beyoncé and Kanye West are mutual favorites — and fashion, that international girl-talk topic.